Skeptics Annotated Bible

From Conservapedia

The Skeptics Annotated Bible is an online text of the Bible containing annotations intended for skeptics and atheists. It is edited by Steve Wells, and also contains an annotated Quran and Book of Mormon. Mr. Wells has a B.S in botany and some graduate courses in mathematics and chemistry.[1] Steve Wells has admitted he is not a Bible scholar.[2]

Contents

Contents

The Skeptics Annotated Bible contains the text of the Bible (King James version), with comments alongside many of the Bible verses. Most of these comments are designed to draw attention to alleged absurdities and inconsistencies in the text, according to the clearly atheistic and so biased viewpoint of the authors. The areas of perceived difficulties are broken down into various 'tags'.

Each comment or flag of a particular passage is designed to repeat the simple question, "if this book is the spoken word of God, would this be in it?", yet without taking into account the cultural context in which it was written.

Refutation

The Skeptics Annotated Bible includes many claims which have long since been refuted.
For example, it repeats the claim that 1_Kings 7:23 has the wrong value for pi (the Bible doesn't; see here), and an associated link goes to an external page wherein a blogger quotes a brief Internet conversation wherein one person asks how the Bible could be right and the respondent gives a silly reply.

Editorial commentary in the form of pictures and one-sentence comments are not arguments. SAB is the internet equivalent to a brick wall scribbled with graffiti, or arguing by saying, "nanny nanny boo boo." It performs no analysis of the social background, the literary data, or context. It is merely "instant reaction" from angry Skeptics, and that sort of arguing isn't arguing at all. ... By estimate perhaps 40-50% of SAB's comments are either "argument by outrage" or places where SAB takes moral offense, usually against a cultural norm. ... SAB also demonstrates the sort of provincialism we would expect of the impenetrably ignorant, as for example, they will insert a "laughing head" icon next to verses which describe some Bible social custom with which they are unfamiliar. Imagine what kind of credibility someone would deserve if they read a history of feudal Japan and put a "laughing head" next to descriptions of people taking their shoes off before they enter a home. That is the level of ignorance to which SAB regularly stoops."[3]